The Stage Directors and Choreographers Foundation's Callaway Committee have announced the finalists for this years Joe A. Callaway Awards (the "Joey") for "excellence in the craft of direction and choreography." The award will be presented to the winner at the National Membership Meeting, Nov. 16 at 1501 Broadway.
The finalists are as follows:
Matthew Warchus for Art
Garry Hynes for The Beauty Queen of Leenane
Sam Mendes for Cabaret
Simon McBurney for The Chairs
Pater Askin for Hedwig and the Angry Itch
Jack O'Brien for Pride's Crossing
Frank Galati & Graciela Daniele for Ragtime
Michael Mayer for A View from the Bridge
Past "Joey" recipients include: Moises Kaufman, Julie Taymor, Scott Elliott, Joe Mantello, Harold Prince, and George Wolfe.
In other SDCF news, its staged reading series continues Oct. 26, with Glen Berger's The Wooden Breeks, directed by Dan Fields. In The Wooden Breeks [sic], unearthed coffins have been found to contain scratch marks on the insides -- showing more and more victims are being buried alive. To prevent further catastrophes, a company begins producing "bell devices" that sit on top of the customers' graves and connect to the coffin. One company salesman, has one more device to sell before she makes quota, when she suddenly dies. Has she really died or is it all an elaborate publicity stunt?
Upcoming readings include:
On Nov. 23, Eye of the Beholder, written and directed by Henry Fonte, tells the based-on-truth story of a happily married man who takes what he considers innocent photographs of his six-year-old daughter -- only to be branded a child molester. On Dec. 14, Lisa Hubertson's Sky Fossils directed by Melanie Southerland, in which the mother of a severely deformed child brings a case against the doctors and insurance agents whose mistakes kept her from getting an abortion. But first she must argue that her child should have never been born.
For information and reservations (free) to any of these readings at the CAP 21 space, 18 West 18 St., 6th floor, call (212) 302-5359.
-- By Sean McGrath
